4/3/12 - Added some picture from our newborn session down at the bottom of the post.

I gave birth to my second son on March 2nd, 2012. Most of my labor, however, took place the day and night before on March 1st. Interestingly enough, while I was pregnant with both of my children I believed I would give birth in the month of February. DS1's edd was 2/18/10, but fate brought him to me on 1/16/10, 5 weeks early. Because of this history and having PTL again with this pregnancy, with an edd of 3/2/12 this time, I thought for sure I would have a February baby. Again I was wrong. Even with leap day this year, February came and went and I was still pregnant. Having been 4cm and 50-60% effaced from 35 weeks, everyone had expected me to go early. I really started to feel like I would be pregnant forever even though I knew that wasn't true. I guess maybe my baby was just waiting for March to get here.

So, on March 1st I took ds to the home daycare down the street and went and met my mom for lunch at our favorite healthy Chinese restaurant. I had taken two dulcolax the night before, so my system was nice and cleaned out, but no ctx in the morning. I was 39w2d. We had lunch and then ran some errands at Home Depot and Walmart. My belly had dropped a bit, and people were stopping me in the store to ask me when I was due and if I needed a wheel chair! Throughout the afternoon I was having ctx, but nothing out of the norm and they were not regular at all. I left my mom and went to the grocery store to pick up a bunch of stuff I was craving including avocado and some nice greens. Then picked ds up and we went to the post office before we came home and I started making dinner. As I was making dinner I noticed the ctx were still coming and were getting a bit stronger. Not really painful, but I had to stop and catch my breath a couple of times. I started timing them and the were not regular at all, but the kept coming.

Meanwhile, dh had been on a business trip in Chicago and I wasn't expecting him home until 11pm. The ctx sloed a bit while I got ds off to bed, and then dh called around 8pm. His flight was early and he hadn;t car pooled like I thought he did, so he was going to be home by 9:30 instead of 11. At that point I thought I would try to get the ctx going again since he was on his way so I got the breast pump going and stuck with that for about an hour. The ctx regulated to every 5 minutes, but they were not as intense as they had been earlier in the night.

DH got home and I told him what had been going on. We decided to dtd to see if that would help. It was not all that much fun for me since I was having ctx every 5 min, but it wasn't as uncomfortable as I would have thought either. DH stayed in bed and went to sleep and I went downstairs because the ctx were enough that I couldn't just stay in bed. That was around 10:30 or so. Over the next 45min to an hour my ctx stregthened in intensity and got a bit closer together. By 11:30 I had had about 4 ctx that were 3 min apart and I decided it was time to go to the hossy. The ctx were strong but not totally intense. The only inconvenient thing was that I had a strong urge to pee with each ctx. So, I had no pants on.

I went upstairs and told dh let's go and called my ob. 15 min later we had dropped ds off down the street and were on our way. DH was skeptical about me having no pants, but I assured him my bathrobe would be enough coverage to get me up to L&D and I grabbed a towel so I didn't pee all over the car. The good thing was my bladder was empty by that time. By this time my ctx were 2 min apart and pretty strong and intense. I started moaning through the ctx and that helped a lot. I also did focus on breathing and letting my body relax and do its job. I kept telling myself that the more I allowed each contraction to do its thing the faster it would all be over.

We arrived at the hospital at 12:20am. The got me straight into a delivery room bc of my history of a fast delivery. I didn not want to get in the bed to have them hook up the monitors, but my dr told the nurse she wasn't going to come in until I had the monitors on. I guess they just need to see things on their machines. So onto the monitors I went and in came my OB to check me. I was 7cm and fully effaced. I asked the dr how long she thought it would be and she said it could be a few hours!!! DH says she was just testing me, LOL. She asked me what I wanted to do and I said that I did not like the idea of being in pain but I was afraid of not feeling what my body was doing. We had never talked much about my labor and delivery plan other than that I wanted delayed cord clamping and immediate skin to skin. I told her I would just write everything down. I asked her what she would do and she said natural is always best. I said I would labor on my own and then the nurse offered to take me off of the monitors. "Yes please", I told her. yay! I was free. The nurse offered to fill the labor tub and again I said yes please. My OB said she would be back to check me in an hour.

I had a few more ctx and was pacing back and forth from the bed to the bathroom and doing that whole hip sway thing. The tub was half way full and the nurse asked me to check the temperature of the water. DH was closer and stuck his hand in and said it was fine. I put my hand in and it was the hottest water I had ever felt in my life!!!! What were they thinking? The next ctx I felt a bit of pressure and told the nurse. She went to get my OB so she could check me again.

She was there a couple of minutes later and I was 9cm with a bit of a cervical lip. The dr said that she could break my water and I would probably deliver the baby in about 10 minutes or I could go ahead and continue to labor in the tub if I wanted. About this time my ob suggested I take off my bra (it was the only thing I had on) but I didn't want to move because I was so focused on the work of labor that I said no. Sometime over the next couple of ctx she just instructed me to roll to the side and allow the nurse to take it off. I am grateful that she just gently told me what to do and off came the bra so that I could have the baby on my bare chest when he was born.

In the meantime dh had taken my birth plan out of my purse (I had types and printed out 4 copies) but he neglected to show it to anyone. MY ob just happened to notice it sitting on the table and asked if she could see it (I will paste a copy below). She made a joking comment about how she would like to see the instructions so she knew what she was supposed to do. It wasn't sarcastic, but seriously dh!!!! The nurse asked to see a copy too. They quickly read over it and I told her to go ahead and break my water.

My ob warned me that the contractions would be much stronger when she broke my water. I was surprised that I felt the gush, but I did not feel any pain right away. I was between ctx and since I had reached transition they were getting further apart. Then there was a lot of pain with the next ctx and I was very motivated to push. I heard myself moaning much louder and I wondered if that would be scary for another laboring mother to hear, but no one in the room seemed to think I was doing anything wrong. I also knew that I would be much quieter soon when I was pushing.

I did not feel much pressure, but I started bearing down and my OB did a great job of encouraging me. I pushed a couple times with the next ctx and was told that she could see the baby's head. I let one ctx pass without pushing bc I did not feel and urge to push or any pressure. I rested and had the opportunity to focus and catch my breath. With the next one I pushed hard a few times and out came his head. I wasn't even sure that his head was out because I had my eyes closed and was in the "zone". I asked if it was out and she told me yes. I was still feeling quite a bit of pain so I pushed his body out and as I opened my eyes I saw a huge amount of fluid gush out and cover my OB and the resident that was in the room. Hair, faces and all. What a relief to deliver the rest of him! I almost felt bad about soaking them, but also thought it was pretty funny.

She placed the baby on my chest. I was in heaven! It was 1:05am. After a few moments a nurse suctioned his mouth a little and we wiped him off a bit together and I just looked him over. Several minutes/moments? later she said the cord had stopped pulsing and asked dh if he wanted to cut it. He said no and they offered for me to cut it so I did. I asked if I could nurse him (not sure why I asked????) and the nurse said no because they wanted to weigh him first. In hindsight that was silly and ridiculous, but at the time I didn't care because baby was perfect and in my arms and I knew I would let them weigh him and then nurse him. A minute later she said, "Stephanie the placenta is right here." I pushed and out it came.

About 20 minutes later I allowed them to weigh him and wash his head. Somewhere in there my dr told me I had a small tear and stitched it up. I asked if there was any tears by my urethra because I had felt something there as I delivered his head. At first she said no, but upon closer examination she said there was a small tear by the urethra. She asked if I wanted her to stitch it, but I said no. With ds1 I had a stitch there and the stitch dissolving caused more trouble than the tear itself. The dr and nurse were both guessing that the baby weighed about 7-7.5lbs. We were all surprised when they placed him on the scale and he was a whopping 8lb 10oz. Honestly, he was no more difficult to deliver than ds1 was at 5lb 14oz.

They gave him back to me with a clean head, a hat, and a diaper on, and then I nursed him for awhile. DH had called our parents and my mom and his parents were on their way. His parents live about an hour and a half away and my mom an half an hour away from the hospital. My mom got there around 2:15am and his parents shortly after 3am. They let us all just continue to hang out in the delivery room and the time just flew by. At 4am they moved me to a pp room, and everyone left around 5am. I was totally in love with my baby and sooo happy with the way my delivery went. It was truly awesome!!!

Dh let me name him and I chose Andrew Nicholas. Andrew had a bit of jaundice but nothing of consequence really. We were discharged the next day around 1pm. His discharge weight was 8lb 1oz and the next day at a weight/jaundice check at the pedi he was 7lb 13.5oz. Another day after that my milk came in. 4 days after the 7lb13.5oz weight check he was back up to 8lb10oz and at his 2 week check he weighed 9lb9oz. Go mama milk!!!! He nurses like a champ and is just a really sweet baby.

DS1 loves his baby brother and gets very concerned if he doesn't know where he is or if he is crying. There has been am adjustment period and some tantrums, but all in all I am surprised that ds1 has been so in tune with the baby. Today andrew is 23 days old and I feel like he has been here forever. I know I have been with him throughout the pregnancy, but I just feel like I have known him for a long time. He is my son, and I am in love!

Pics:

The day before I delivered

After delivery

The next day

DS1 was jumping around like a wild one!

First CD pic

Here is my birth Plan:

Labor, Delivery & Postpartum/Postnatal Plan

EDD: 3/6/12

Labor and Delivery:
• Goal of natural labor and delivery
• Would like to avoid any pain medication other than Motrin/Advil/Tylenol postpartum
• As little medical intervention as possible
• Respectfully decline IV placement unless deemed medically necessary due to a complication
• Please do not confine me to the bed if I feel it is too confining/restricting
• No episiotomy please
• Allow cord to stop pulsing before clamping/cutting.
After Delivery:
• I do not want to be stitched by a student/resident. Please only allow a Doctor from Women’s Health Associates to stitch me after delivery.
• Decline pitocin shot unless deemed medically necessary due to complications
• Would like skin to skin with baby immediately after delivery
• Want to put baby to breast as soon as possible.
• Please examine/evaluate/clean & dry baby bedside. I know, I know, he has to be weighed right?...
• When taking baby to be weighed, just ask and let me know what you will be doing.
• Decline antibiotic eye ointment for baby
• Please do not administer any meds to me or baby without clearly communicating what it is and allowing me to either approve or decline.
Additional Comments;
My son was delivered at 35 weeks, and had to go to NICU soon after delivery. The labor and delivery went very quickly, and he was delivered in an L&D triage room. Despite these issues, I was grateful to not have any meds/medical intervention during delivery and I hope to have that experience again. I do understand that this may not be possible, and that I may change my wishes depending on how labor progresses. The above labor and delivery goals/wishes are based on my previous experience and I hope to have the wonderful labor and delivery outlined here. That being said, I would appreciate assistance and support from the hospital staff to accomplish these goals.

Adding some Pics from our Newborn photos:

I am trying to pick something for the birth announcement. Please be honest, does his eye look totally weird in this pic?

It sounds like everyone was really respectful of your wishes; that is great! Congratulations. You sound like you were a lot more aware than I was during pushing; I seriously don't remember it that much and it just happened monday!